Composed over 1889/90, the Seven Songs from the Norwegian for voice and piano are among Delius' earliest publications—by Augener in 1892—though one would hardly guess from them that he had already indited a quantity of viable orchestral music, including the winsome Florida Suite of 1887. Although Delius was fluent in Norwegian, to reach the widest audience, the settings were made to German translations from which translations into English—the language in which they are most frequently heard now—further diluted the concisely bucolic poetry of the Norwegian originals. Nonetheless, these seven numbers forecast several central Delian preoccupations—nostalgia for communion with nature in "The Homeward Journey" (lyrics by A. O. Vinje) deepening into nostalgic longing for a fantastic realm just beyond the human in "Twilight Fancies" (Bjørnson). Flirtation going astray in "Young Venevil" (Bjørnson) is given a jocund turn, complemented by a beguilingly blithesome rendering of lost love in "The Bird's Story" (Ibsen). "Secret Love" (Bjørnson) sketches a tale of unacknowledged mutual attraction worthy of Henry James, though Delius matches it with heavy melodrama—throbbing chords in the right hand setting off portentous octave gropings plumbing the depths in the left—over which a laconic vocal line makes for unintended deadpan comedy. "The Cradle Song" (Ibsen), too, is conventionally treacly, though not without moments redolent of Delian rapture. While the foregoing songs are usually taken by female vocalists, "The Minstrel" (Ibsen) is something of an odd man out in calling for a baritone and has therefore been overlooked. The misconceived "Secret Love" aside, these songs are reliant upon Grieg's in their straightforward, reliable moments of lyric fiat and have maintained a margin of relative popularity from the moment of their appearance, attested by a number of recordings past and present. Delius, by the way, found "Twilight Fancies" and "The Bird's Story" worthy of sumptuous, ingratiating orchestrations. Appropriately, the collection is dedicated to Nina Grieg. These songs were also the earliest gift of Delius to the woman who became his wife, Jelka Rosen. She enchanted him, literally, by singing them to him.

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